50 explained that often times, the production is completed prior to him laying a verse. “You got a lot of guys that make records and everything’s done for you before you get there. The producer actually made the record. It has a sample playing and a chorus, you did your verse, you have three other rappers that generate interest from different demographics rap behind you and it’s done.”

Fif added a caveat, stating that there was some utility in that type of recording process. “Those records, they’re good too because sometimes those are the things that you don’t have to think about. You hear it, you go, ‘Okay, I know what it is,’ and you just party to it. There’s no substance to it that makes you stop and think.”

The Queens emcee explained how “Wait Until Tonight” brought him back to earlier times insofar as the recording process. “‘Wait Until Tonight,’ for me that’s a representation of what I fell in love with in the beginning of me enjoying Hip Hop culture. With the actual writers, it’s [from] when we watch each other and see what we offer and try and top it. It was about being competitive, not just going back and forth arguing with each other. Now they think being competitive is beefing. But they didn’t use that terminology until after the Biggie and 2Pac situation went bad. They would have called it battling prior to that. They think that’s being competitive, saying something about someone else, not actually making a record that impacts.”